Soaps have been utilized for many years to remove soil from the human body and fabrics. Although the irritation factor of soaps are of little or no consequence for use in fabric cleansing, the usage of various other detergents in personal care of mammals including humans is becoming of even greater significance. Synthetic detergents are used in combination with traditional soaps in various new body cleansing products. Various detergents include long chain sulfonates, sulfates, taurates, non-ionic detergents such as amides or amido compounds and cationic materials. These materials include, for example, specific sulfonate salts such as isethionates usually in the long chain acyl form such as the cocoyl moiety or as derivatives of glyceryl such as long chain alkyl glyceryl ether sulfonates. Combination bars utilizing the synthetic detergent and various quantities of soap have been successfully commercialized in materials known as "Dove" and "Oil of Olay". The search for further combinations of synthetic detergents which will bring about increased mildness to the skin of users of such cleansing formulations continues.
A new composition of synthetic detergents has been found which is unusually non-irritating to skin as well as maintaining excellent and in some cases even better detergency activity with respect to lathering characteristics compared to certain commercial formulations.